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This morning under the leadership of the Holy Spirit, we will be looking at The Satisfaction of The Word. And this that the Holy Spirit wants to share with us this morning is something that He wants us to understand and walk in the reality of it. It’s not enough to know, you must start walking in the reality of the knowledge. That’s why the Bible says “blessed is he that does the word of God, not the hearer alone.“ And it admonished us, don’t just be a hearer alone of the word, be a doer of it. Because it is in doing it, that you are blessed. It is in doing it that you become rewarded. And as we look at this word this today, I pray that we would not just be the hearer of this word but doers of it in the name of Jesus.
When we hear the word satisfaction, what is the first thing that comes to mind? Satisfaction is what many people desire, I am sure you desire satisfaction of some kind and I also desire it. But what does it means to be satisfied? Another word for satisfaction, is being full. And I want us to observe that definition from Proverbs 27, which would be our anchor text this morning. Proverbs 27, I will read from verse 7. The Bible says: “A satisfied soul loathes the honeycomb, But to a hungry soul, every bitter thing is sweet.”
I will read it in the Good News Bible version and Amplified. Because some us will be asking what’s the meaning of Loathe? In the Good News version it says “when you are full” and I love that word. In NKJV it says “when you are satisfied” So, another word for satisfy is that you are full; and it says “when you are full you will refuse honey.” You know honey is very sweet and tempting. In fact, many of us love to lick it like that even when you are full. But this Proverbs says when you are full you will refuse honey, even though it is inviting, even though its desirable, you will refuse it. But when you are hungry, even bitter food tastes sweet.
So, in this context, the opposite of being full, being satisfied; is being hungry. And in Amplified it says; “He who is satiated [with sensual pleasures] loathes and treads under foot a honeycomb “ That person treats honey like it is nothing. “But to the hungry soul” , the reason why I love this translation is that it puts it as the hungry soul. It says “to a hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet.” To the hungry soul, I don’t want us to forget this translations that we have read. Because we are looking at the satisfaction of the word. How can we be full? How can we become satisfied? We are looking at satisfaction with this definition we saw in Proverbs 27:7.
When you become so full that you treat honey with despise. When you look at honey and you refuse it. When you are so cool. What can give that satisfaction? How can we get satisfied? And what does it mean to be that satisfied, to be that full? Another word for satisfaction, we said, it is being full. It also mean “being contented.”, you don’t want to what you have. You are okay.
Contentment. Because when you are contented, you don’t want to add more to what you have. If you are full you are full, you don’t want to add anything extra, you don’t want to add anything more. You are okay. So contentment is another word for Satisfaction and all these words that we are giving this meanings, we are giving meanings because of what we are going to delve into.
Another word for satisfaction or contentment or being full is full pleasure. Full pleasure not partial. We are not just saying pleasure, full pleasure. That’s being satisfied. It also means gratification. You are gratified, you have what you want, what you desire. And I want us to look into the Scripture, and what are the things God says about satisfaction. In psalm 107:9 It says; “He” If you look at your Bible the “He” there is with Capital “H” Meaning that it is God. Psalm 107:9 says: “For He satisfies the longing soul.” Remember where we read in Amplified in Proverbs 27:7. It said he who is satiated loathe and tread under foot honey comb. The hungry soul, the same thing the Bible is saying here for He satisfies the longing soul And fills the hungry soul with goodness.
God satisfies the longing soul which is the same thing as the hungry soul. And when you talk about the soul. We are talking about the hungry soul now. What is the major thing that we feed the soul with? Knowledge, information. So the Bible says God satisfies the longing soul not with anything else but knowledge. But that knowledge is found in something, it’s found somewhere. It’s found in a person. And He said He satisfies the longing soul. So if you are a hungry soul. God satisfies, there is satisfaction in God. And it says He fills the hungry soul with His goodness. When you talk about the gospel.
Another word for gospel is good news. So the goodness of God is the gospel. Which is His word. So God brings satisfaction to us. If you are hungry, if you are longing. A longing soul is a desirous soul. You want something. Do you say a longing soul is contented? No! There is a vacuum, there is something he desires, there is something he wants There is something you are pursuing, and the Bible says He satisfies, we must not forget this point, God satisfies. So if you are a soul that is longing, a soul that is hungry, a soul that is longing, God satisfies. But God does not just satisfy you anyhow. He satisfies you with His goodness of His word.
Let us look at the satisfaction story again in Isaiah 58:11. I would begin from verse 10. The Bible says: “If you extend your soul to the hungry And satisfy the afflicted soul, Then your light shall dawn in the darkness, And your darkness shall be as the noonday. The LORD will guide you continually, And satisfy your soul.” We could see that it is the word soul that is coming up, it says “He will satisfy your soul in drought, And strengthen your bones; You shall be like a watered garden, And like a spring of water, whose waters do not fail.” You will see that every time He is talking about satisfaction, every time He talking about meeting our desires, satisfying us, He is talking about you been hungry, when He said he will satisfy your soul in drought that means you are in need. When you are in need He will satisfy. And when we talk about what it means to satisfy, when we really need to be satisfied when you are hungry? What do you ask for? Food. And if you will simplify it, you will say bread and water. And when the word is being described, it is described as bread, as food and as water.
I want us to see it in John 6 so that we will understand that if our soul is longing, we must know what we are longing for and how we can be satisfied. John 6:31-35., the Bible says: “Our fathers ate the manna in the desert; as it is written, He gave them bread from heaven to eat. Then Jesus said to them, Most assuredly, I say to you, Moses did not give you the bread from heaven, but My Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world. Then they said to Him, Lord, give us this bread always. And Jesus said to them, I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall never hunger, Do you see hunger? and he who believes in Me shall never thirst.
Listen to Podcast: The Satisfaction of The Word
I am the bread of life. In John 1:1-3 the Bible says: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” So, Jesus the bread of life, He is the word of life, He is the word and the bread, why did He use the word bread? Because He is the one that satisfies us. We are hungry, so He has become bread food for us. He satisfies us with food which is His word. So as a believer, the hunger of your soul, the longing of your soul is for the word, it cannot be satisfied elsewhere, in nothing else but the word. The hunger of your soul and the longing of your soul is not in speaking in tongues it is the word. If you have not received the word, you have not received what can satisfy you. And that’s why Jesus said I am the bread of life. In John 4:10, so that we understand that every time the word is being described, it always talks about our satisfaction.
It’s quite a lengthy passage but for the sake of our study, I will just read quickly from verse 10-14. This was a conversation that happened between Jesus and the woman at the well, And at this point in verse 10 Jesus had asked her to give Him a drink. “Jesus answered and said to her, If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, Give Me a drink, you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water. do we see that? The woman said to Him, Sir, You have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do You get that living water? Are You greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank from it himself, as well as his sons and his livestock? Lets rush quickly to verse. Jesus answered and said to her, Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, that’s the water she has, but in verse 14 He said but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.”
The water I give him to drink. And if you continue the conversation down to 26, you would realize there was a longing in the soul of this woman. This Samaritan woman was hungry for something and Jesus recognized that there is a thirst in her. She wanted to know the Messiah. She wanted to know the way out of her misery. She wanted the way out of the problem of her life. And that’s why Jesus asked her a question go and call your husband for me. And the woman said “I have no husband.” He said “you spoke very well.” Because you have been in a dilemma all these years. You don’t know what direction your life should go.
You have been with so many men even the one that you are with now is not your husband. And you would realize that this woman, at that point Said wow nobody has been able to satisfy, nobody has been able to satisfy that thirst in my soul. She has always been coming to the well to draw but at this point, the real need in her life was met. Not by the water of the well but by the water of life. She was satisfied by the water of life, not the one she was drawing from the well of Jacob. That means that there are different waters and different breads in life, but the one that satisfies is the word. Until the word comes into your life you are not satisfied.
And I want us to see quickly Isaiah 55. Until the word comes into your life, you are not satisfied. So, the thirst and the hunger still continues until you encounter the word. And see what God said about His word in Isaiah 55, from verse 6 down to verse 11. But I will read from verse 8. The Bible says: “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, Nor are your ways My ways says the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways, And My thoughts than your thoughts. For as the rain comes down, and the snow from heaven, And do not return there, But water the earth, And make it bring forth and bud, That it may give seed to the sower And bread to the eater, So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth; It shall not return to Me void, But it shall accomplish what I please, And it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it.”
If you look at verse 10, when God was going to describe His word, He described it as water, when He was going to end in the Scripture He said it gives bread to the eater. He satisfies. Nothing satisfies like the word of God. If there is a longing in your soul a vacuum in any area it is the word of God that brings satisfaction. We remember the story of the man that was at the gate called Beautiful, that man had been begging for alms all his life, at that gate. He decided to situate himself at the gate of the temple because he believes he has come close to the presence of God.
And for years, all he has been getting were small change from people, small change from the wells of Jacob, small change from people that have come to the temple and there came a time when this man encountered the word the bread of life, the water of life. When peter came to the temple he said silver and gold we have none, we are not coming to give you water from the well of Jacob we are coming to give you what God has put in us that springs to eternal life, we have come to draw from that fountain. And he said in the name of Jesus, the word! Let the very need of your life which is not silver and gold. May you be satisfied.
And the Bible says “they helped him up and his bones received strength and he started jumping.” He started limping for Joy. Because his need, the vacuum of his life that silver and gold could not meet it. So when the word comes, the word comes to satisfy. That’s why the Bible says in that Psalm 107 verse 9, it says: “He satisfies the longing soul.” What is it that you are longing for? It is the word that satisfies. Many of us think what we need is money, it’s not! Many think if I can just get a new job, if I can just get a job that the pay is 750,000 per month, I will be okay. But it’s not true. For that woman at the well she started changing location, looking for satisfaction, she could not get it. Until she encountered the word, until she encountered Jesus.
So what you need is the satisfaction of the word. The word brings you to a place of contentment. The word brings you to a place of full pleasure. The word brings you to a place of gratification, the word brings you to a place where you are full. And when you are full there is nothing else you need. That’s why you see the apostles, when they told them to deny Christ, it was like somebody offering them honey and they were full. They decided to thread upon it. They said “just deny Jesus and you will live.” They said what!! We don’t need that freedom, we have liberty in the spirit. Where the spirit of God is there is liberty what other liberty are we looking for? And they were full so they could resent they could disdain the freedom that comes from the well of Jacob. They were contented in the word. That’s why they said we can’t but speak, we can’t but share, we can’t but interact with people about this life that we have in Christ. We are full we are satisfied.
And when you look at them, did they have house in Victoria Garden City? Did they own a plot of land in Banana Island? No! The word gave them satisfaction, that was what is essential for them. And that is why if we are not careful. God said in Isaiah 55 “my thoughts are not your thoughts, my ways are not your ways”, if you can but seek a word from Him, you will come to a higher dimension of glory. When you are living by design and not by default. When your life is expressing eternity. I want us to see Ephesians 4 from verse 10 to verse 15. The Bible says: “He who descended is also the One who ascended far above all the heavens, that He might fill all things. And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ;”
Do we see that? I Am sure we are familiar with this particular Scripture, it says “till we all come to the unity of faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; that we should no longer be children.” This is the reason, the reason why? We should all come to the fullness of the stature of Christ is so that we will no longer be children because when we all come to measure of the fullness of Christ we are full, we are satisfied, we are okay, we have full pleasure, we have gratification. When we come to that point when we come to the unity of faith, and in the knowledge of the son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure. There is a measure that we must come to when nothing else will make us thirsty or hungry again.
That is the measure of the fullness of Christ. When the word becomes flesh and it dwells inside of you. That’s why Jesus said to that woman in John 4, He said “this water will be in you. This word will be in you a fountain of life.” And this fountain springs not to 2060, not to 2050 but into everlasting. It continues to produce satisfaction, it continues to produce contentment, it continues to produce gratification in you. So you don’t thirst again. So, the Bible says when we come to that measure of the fullness of Christ, we will not be children, we will not be hungry or thirsty again. We are not looking for what is not relevant. In Proverbs 27:7, the Bible says that “a man that is satisfied will thread upon honey, as if it means nothing.” But a hungry soul even what is bitter, even a doctrine of men that does not sound pleasant in the ears; will be sweet in his mouth.
That’s why you will look around and you will find men and women that don’t have the word, they are the men and women that are into so many things that if you look at it, you will know that this thing is bitter, but it is sweet in their mouth. Why? They are hungry. There is a longing in their soul. That’s a hungry soul. When you see a man that is doing something that is displeasing to God, and he is excited about it, then know that is a hungry soul. He is doing what is bitter, he is feeding on bitterness. And it’s sweet to him. Because he is not satisfied. That man can have 100 billion in his account, he is hungry. That’s the definition of it. A dissatisfied man is a hungry man.
And the Bible says, this is the expression of them. It says in verse 14 of Ephesians 4, that “they are like children tossed to-and-fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine.” They are just moving. When they say hah!, there is food in Zango, they are there, they are now serving dinner in Dutse; they are there. That’s the people you see that go from crusade to crusade; from revival to revival, hungry soul. And they are serving them bitter food but it taste sweet. So if you want to do a litmus test, you are finding hungry people that’s it. People that are “tossed to and fro like children, tossed to and fro carried about by every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting,”
But see Ephesians 4:15, it says: “but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head–Christ.” who is the word, the bread of life, the word of life. And what is the reason why we are saying this? There is another thing I want us to see that talks about why we must be satisfied with the word, why our satisfaction must be from the word. In Isaiah 55:2, God was asking a question and I want us to see it very quickly. Let’s start from verse one. It says: “Ho! Everyone who thirsts, Come to the waters; And you who have no money, Come, buy and eat. He knows you need satisfaction, He said; Yes, come, buy wine and milk Without money and without price. Why do you spend money for what is not bread, And your wages for what does not satisfy? Listen carefully to Me, and eat what is good, eat the word, eat the bread of life, drink the water of life; and let your soul delight itself in abundance; Abundance is in the word. It said in verse 3; Incline your ear, and come to Me.”
God is saying “Hear, and your soul shall live.” And I will make an everlasting covenant with you, The sure mercies of David, that’s God speaking to you and I. Stop going to the well of Jacob, it can’t satisfy the longing of your soul, it can’t satisfy that hunger. Come! It’s an invitation, God is inviting you, come to the waters, come to the fountain of life, come to God that truly satisfies. It is not for us to continue to go about tossed to and fro by every wind of doctrine, let’s be satisfied by the word, lets come to the word and be satisfied.
I want us to see something in 1 Peter 1:23 so that we would understand as believers who we are.1 Peter1:23, the Bible says: “having been born again, not of corruptible seed but incorruptible, through the word of God which lives and abides forever.” Having been born again; that’s the word to us leaders. So, we are born of the seed of the word. Once you become born again, you become a word, that God has sent forth as a seed on the earth. And in Isaiah 55, God said “I will watch over my word to perform it, it will prosper in that which I sent it.” That is talking about you. God is talking about me, God is talking about you, that incorruptible seed that He has put on the earth.
The only thing that gives satisfaction is the word. Haven being born again, you can’t be satisfied any longer by the wells of Jacob. Motivational speech cannot satisfy you. Information from the world; from CNN and BBC cannot satisfy you. What can satisfy you is the word of God, because you are born of that seed. So, you are a new wine skin. You can’t have old wine in you. You can only be satisfied and retain being satisfied, being full by the new wine which is the word, the Spirit of God. So, enough of finding satisfaction elsewhere, our satisfaction is in the word. That’s why I love the way the Scripture puts it, it’s always talking about your soul, your spirit is born again, now your soul has been hungry, your soul has been longing and you have been carrying that soul about for satisfaction and God is bringing us to a place of understanding this morning.
It is only the knowledge of the Son of God, the word; that can satisfy the longing of your soul, haven been born again. Haven being born again of a new Spirit, you need a renewal of your mind by the Spirit, by the word of God. You need a time when you sit down and let the Lord pour His water into you, the knowledge of God not from the world. You are hungry in your finances, you need to be satisfied by the word. You are hungry in your marriage, you need to be satisfied by the word. You are hungry in your education, you need to be satisfied by the word. You are hungry in your character, the word is what will satisfy you. There is no area of hunger that the word does not satisfy.
Enough of taking our soul to places, that will receive nothing where we take a little water and we thirst again where we get exhausted. You will say “I have tried everything they wrote in that book, it’s not working.” It can’t work. If it even works, it works for a season, you will thirst again. That was what Jesus was saying to that woman at the well. Every time you come and look for solution, you tell that your neighbour and she gives you one tip and you use the tip and it gets exhausted you now come to her again. That’s being children, tossed to and fro.
But it says there is a satisfaction that comes once and for all. The satisfaction that settles you for life. It is the word, it settles you for life. There is nothing we are looking for that is not in the word. There is no area of your life that is hungry and longing that there is no satisfaction in the word. You just need to sit down. That’s why Jesus said to that woman. I would love us to study John 4:10 to 26 very well. The woman started talking about the fact that our ancestors worship in Jerusalem, we have to worship on this Mountain. He said there comes a time when God is no longer interested in all those mountains and those places of worship. When the true worshipers of God will seek Him in Spirit and in truth for God is Spirit and anyone that would worship Him must worship Him in Spirit and in truth. That’s the word that sets free, that’s the word that satisfies.
I pray the Lord will help us in the name of Jesus.
[Centre for New Dimension Leadership]
